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(CNN)House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday Republicans plan to repeal President Barack Obama's health care law at the same time they approve a GOP replacement plan.

"We want to do this at the same time, and in some cases in the same bill," Ryan said during a town hall in Washington sponsored by CNN and moderated by Jake Tapper. "So we want to advance repealing this law with its replacement at the same time."

Ryan said Republicans are moving "as quickly as they can" to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, but said he doesn't yet have a date, and it will take "a little bit of time" to do so.

"We're working on this as fast as possible," he said, adding that the GOP will act "definitely within these first 100 days" of Trump's presidency.

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Paul Ryan: Obamacare law is collapsing

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He added that he supports elements of the health care law -- including that "people with pre-existing conditions, no matter how much money they make," should have access to insurance.

But, he said, "The law is collapsing, and so we've got to rescue people."

Ryan faces a tough balancing act as he leads the House at the outset of Trump's administration. He's attempting to hold together an unruly set of Republicans that includes Trump loyalists who want to see the President-elect's populist policies swiftly enacted, fiscal hawks who fret about the price tag of those policies and moderates still leery of the President-elect. Meanwhile, Democrats appear set to deny the GOP even limited support on any major initiatives.

Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

President-elect Donald Trump shakes hands with Martin Luther King III after they met at Trump Tower in New York on Monday, January 16. Afterward, King said the meeting was "constructive" and that the two discussed the importance of voting accessibility. Trump didn't speak to the media about the meeting.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump speaks at Trump Tower in New York on Wednesday, January 11. In his first news conference since winning the election, a combative Trump made clear he will not mute his style when he is inaugurated on January 20. He lashed out at media and political foes alike.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

US Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump's nominee for attorney general, is sworn in during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday, January 10. Trump and his transition team are in the process of filling high-level positions for the new administration.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Jared Kushner, Trump's son-in-law, arrives on Capitol Hill for a meeting with House Speaker Paul Ryan on Monday, January 9. Kushner, a 35-year-old businessman-turned-political strategist, will be senior adviser to the president, a senior transition official told CNN.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump gets on an elevator after speaking with reporters at New York's Trump Tower on January 9.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump stands with Alibaba Executive Chairman Jack Ma, Asia's richest man, as they walk to speak with reporters at Trump Tower on January 9. Ma met with Trump to tease plans for creating "one million" jobs in the United States. Trump praised Ma after the meeting as a "great, great entrepreneur and one of the best in the world."

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump stands with legendary boxing promoter Don King after meeting at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, on Wednesday, December 28. Trump and King met to discuss the relationship between Israel and the United States.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump attends a meeting with Steve Bannon, chief White House strategist and senior counselor, at his Mar-a-Lago resort on Wednesday, December 21. Trump spent the holidays in Mar-a-Lago.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway talks to the press in the lobby of Trump Tower in New York on Thursday, December 15. Conway, who was Trump's campaign manager, will work in his administration as "counselor to the president," it was announced on Thursday, December 22.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump meets with technology executives in New York on Wednesday, December 14. From left are Jeff Bezos, chief executive officer of Amazon; Larry Page, chief executive officer of Google's parent company Alphabet; Sheryl Sandberg, chief operating officer of Facebook; and Vice President-elect Mike Pence. The three main areas discussed were jobs, immigration and China, according to a source briefed on the meeting.

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Three of Trump's children -- from left, Donald Jr., Ivanka and Eric -- attend the meeting with tech leaders on December 14.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump, Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan wave during an event in West Allis, Wisconsin, on Tuesday, December 13. "He's like a fine wine," Trump said of Ryan at the rally, which was part of his "thank you" tour to states that helped him win the election. "Every day that goes by, I get to appreciate his genius more and more."

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump and rapper Kanye West speak to the press after meeting at Trump Tower in New York on December 13. Trump called West a "good man" and told journalists that they have been "friends for a long time." West later tweeted that he met with Trump to discuss "multicultural issues."

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump selected former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, right, to be his nominee for energy secretary, which would make Perry the head of an agency he once suggested he would eliminate.

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Trump has tapped ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson to serve as secretary of state, the transition team announced December 13. Tillerson, seen here at a conference in 2015, has no formal foreign-policy experience, but he has built close relationships with many world leaders by closing massive deals across Eurasia and the Middle East on behalf of the world's largest energy company.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump waves during the Army-Navy football game, which was played in Baltimore on Saturday, December 10.

Trump shakes hands with Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad at an event in Des Moines, Iowa, on Thursday, December 8. Trump re-introduced Branstad as his pick for US ambassador to China.

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Trump greets retired Marine Gen. James Mattis at a rally in Fayetteville, North Carolina, on Tuesday, December 6. Trump said he would nominate Mattis as his defense secretary.

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Trump speaks to members of the media at Trump Tower in New York on December 6.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump visits the Carrier air-conditioning company in Indianapolis on Thursday, December 1. Carrier announced that it had reached a deal with Trump and Vice President-elect Mike Pence, who is currently governor of Indiana, to keep about 1,000 of 1,400 jobs at its Indianapolis plant rather than move them to Mexico. The Carrier plant had been a theme of Trump's campaign promise to prevent more jobs from being outsourced to other countries.

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Trump and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney share a meal in New York on Tuesday, November 29. Romney was reportedly in the running for secretary of state.

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Trump waves to a crowd at The New York Times building after meeting with some of the newspaper's reporters, editors and columnists on Tuesday, November 22. Six takeaways from the meeting

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Trump is flanked by Pence and Romney after a meeting in Bedminster Township, New Jersey, on Saturday, November 19.

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"60 Minutes" correspondent Lesley Stahl interviews Trump and his family at his New York home on Friday, November 11. It was Trump's first television interview since the election.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

House Speaker Paul Ryan shows Trump and his wife, Melania, the Speaker's Balcony at the US Capitol on Thursday, November 10.

Trump walks with his wife and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell after a meeting at the US Capitol on November 10.

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Photos:In transition: President-elect Trump

Trump shakes hands with President Barack Obama following a meeting in the Oval Office on November 10. Obama told his successor that he wanted him to succeed and would do everything he could to ensure a smooth transition.

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Trump delivers his acceptance speech during his election night event at the New York Hilton Midtown hotel on Wednesday, November 9.

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Ryan, who waited weeks to even endorse Trump after he clinched the GOP nomination, also now knows his party's electoral fate is largely tied to his ability to help Trump succeed. And he remains committed to his own, much more detailed policy platform, years in the making. Ryan had long sought a Republican president to sign his entitlement reforms and budget cuts into law -- but hadn't counted on this Republican president.

'Do you think that I should be deported?'

Ryan was asked point-blank by a woman whose parents brought her to the US as an undocumented immigrant at age 11, and who has remained in the country for 21 years since: "Do you think that I should be deported?"

"I can see that you love your daughter and you're a nice person who has a great future ahead of you, and I hope your future's here," Ryan responded.

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Trump has pledged to repeal Obama's executive actions that allowed undocumented immigrants brought into the country as children and their families to remain in the country without fear of deportation.

Ryan said lawmakers are talking with Trump's transition team about those immigrants -- and said Trump's focus is on violent criminals and building a US-Mexico border wall.

"That's the problem he wants to focus on. This is not the focus. And so what we have to do is find a way to ensure that you can get right with the law," he said. "We have to figure out how to fix this, but to do that, people need to have confidence that our laws are being followed, people know who's coming and going and we need to have a secure border."

"What we have to do is figure out how to have a humane solution to this very legitimate, sincere problem, and respect the rule of law," Ryan said.

Tapper asked Ryan if Republicans would seek a law barring the federal government from using information submitted by those allowed to remain in the US through Obama's executive actions to deport those individuals.

Ryan responded that though some fear a deportation force, "it's not happening."

Tapper responded that Trump had actually talked of creating a "deportation force" on the campaign trail.

He did, however, take a hard line on "sanctuary cities" that don't deport undocumented immigrants.

"Sanctuary cities are a violation of the rule of law, and they are not to be tolerated," he said. "That means if you want federal assistance, you're not going to get it. You've got to enforce the law," Ryan said, referring to cities that adopt such policies.

Russia

Ryan took a tough line on Russia, saying the United States must "step up our game" and adopt a "stronger Russia engagement policy, for sure, across the board."

"The fact that a foreign government tried to meddle in another government's election is wrong," Ryan said, calling for stronger sanctions against the country.

He called Russia a "global menace led by a man who is menacing."

"Vladimir Putin does not share our interests," Ryan said. "He frustrates our interests. He violates his neighbors. ... He's not democratic. I really think a lot of the things that he is doing is to try to delegitimize the other democracies so that his illegitimate democracy doesn't look as illegitimate by comparison."

That's a contrast to Trump, who has praised Putin, the Russian president. The President-elect acknowledged at the Wednesday news conference that he thought Russia was responsible for the hack but blamed poor cybersecurity at the Democratic National Committee and said Putin wouldn't take such actions under a Trump administration.

Ryan said he believes intelligence -- including a two-page summary of unverified claims that Russian operatives claim to have compromising personal and financial information about Trump -- that CNN exclusively reported was presented to Trump and Obama last week -- "has been politicized."

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Ryan comments on claims involving Russia

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Ryan comments on claims involving Russia02:47

Still, he defended the intelligence community, saying of Trump: "I think he's going to learn that there are a lot of good men and women in the intelligence community who risk their lives to keep us safe."

But, in a nod to Trump's complaints that some news organizations published the uncorroborated details, Ryan said: "I completely understand why he's frustrated that eight, nine days before his inauguration, this junk gets thrown out there."

CNN has not published or aired any of the uncorroborated details from the memo.

Planned Parenthood

The speaker was pressed at the town hall on the GOP's push to block Planned Parenthood from receiving federal health care dollars for services provided to women because the organization provides abortions -- even though abortions are not covered by taxpayer dollars.

"We don't want to commit taxpayer funding for abortion, and Planned Parenthood is the largest abortion provider," he said.

Trump on Twitter

Ryan said he doesn't expect Trump to get off Twitter when he moves into the White House -- and he doesn't know how the President-elect's social media use will affect foreign and domestic policy.

"I think he's going to keep doing this, and I think he's going to be probably a little more restrained in his tweets probably, but it's all relative," Ryan said. "But I do believe it's been extremely effective for getting elected president, I've got to tell you. He was able to touch and tap into people's hearts and minds."